


By Any Other Name

by thejerseydevile, unorigelnal (jayburding)



Series: The MCU Dæmon AU [1]
Category: Marvel Cinematic Universe, Thor (Movies), Thor - All Media Types
Genre: Alternate Universe - Daemons, Gen
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2013-11-22
Updated: 2013-11-22
Packaged: 2018-01-02 07:41:10
Rating: Not Rated
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 977
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/1054216
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/thejerseydevile/pseuds/thejerseydevile, https://archiveofourown.org/users/jayburding/pseuds/unorigelnal
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>
  <i>There’s something wrong about that boy—especially his dæmon.</i>
</p><p> </p><p>  <i>She is a fluid, graceful thing—shimmering, almost ephemeral and at times even transparent, melting into different forms, casting off one shape for the other as quickly as she pleases.</i></p><p> </p><p><i>A thousand years and she still will not (or </i>cannot<i>) settle. </i></p><p> </p><p>  <i>There’s something wrong indeed.</i></p>
            </blockquote>





	By Any Other Name

**Author's Note:**

  * For [thejerseydevile](https://archiveofourown.org/users/thejerseydevile/gifts).



_There’s something wrong about that boy—especially his dæmon._

_She is a fluid, graceful thing—shimmering, almost ephemeral and at times even transparent, melting into different forms, casting off one shape for the other as quickly as she pleases._

_A thousand years and she still will not (or_ cannot _) settle._

_There’s something wrong indeed._

_-_

She slips her names as easily as she slips her forms. Hlín and Tanngrisnir cling to theirs as if a particular random collection of syllables is so intrinsic to their identity that if they lost it they would lose themselves. Perhaps it was; perhaps they would.

For her though, names are no more than another skin. She knows who she is, no matter what the shape and what the word she uses to identify it. And the changes are frequent, and growing more so as she and Loki age. No matter the form she has, inevitably she starts to suffocate in her too tight skin and has to shuck it if she wants to breathe. She can’t understand how any of them can stand to take one form for long, let alone be locked in forever.

At first, she thought their father’s dæmon understood, for she is only a raven some of the time, and answers to Gangleri little more than that, but the blasted sometimes-bird likes to play as if it’s possible to settle and not settle, to have one form and yet wear any other you please. She knew then not to trust any of them with her secrets, with their secrets, so she keeps the stifling truth locked up, another weight in her chest to try and breathe around. Her truths never go further than her other self, for Loki never judges, but praises her changes like she delights in his.

People whisper though, they always do, about her strangeness, how her slippery shapes reflect on Loki, what it must mean that she has not settled, as if it needs to mean anything beyond the fact that she doesn’t want to settle. It doesn’t bother her, but she sees how it weighs on Loki when Thor and Tanngrisnir laugh and say that tricks are clearly for children, when Odin and sometimes-Gangleri turn their stern eyes on them, when Frigga takes her son’s hands and softly asks him if he is well, while Hlín looks down at her from Frigga’s shoulder with secrets in his golden eyes. She sees how Loki rankles at standing out so much, and knows it is her fault, so she tries her best to be what she knows he wants.

The longest she lasts is three turns of the moon as her skin constricts around her and the world seems to shimmer and warp as much as she does. She calls herself Eisa for the red eyes that come with her no matter the shape or name of her, but by the end of the second turn she feels more like a grey Einmyria, burnt out and brittle. Eisa remains her name though, because she’s trying not to change anymore, and she manages another whole turn like that, even if she spends most of it snapping and snarling at Tanngrisnir, with Loki doing the same to Thor. They are ill, and they know it, but if Loki realises it is her fault yet again, he doesn’t speak of it, and Eisa cannot bring herself to. She’s so sick of failing him.

Eventually it cannot be ignored, and Eisa wakes weak and shivery one morning to Hlín hovering over her, the forest cat’s rough tongue running over a cheek that flickers from feather to fur to flesh like flowing water.

“Loki…” she whines, and Hlín hushes her with a nudge of his nose, his golden eyes searching for Frigga as the queen comes to kneel beside the both of them.

“Hold still for me, if you can,” Frigga says, soft and gentle as she wraps the ailing dæmon in a blanket _-_ hot, too  _hot_ \- and lifts her from where she lay beside the bed. She shifts twice in the queen’s arms, cannot even hold the shapes in her mind to know what they are. Loki reaches for her with trembling hands, his eyes so glassy they seem to reflect the red of hers, and she gratefully burrows into his arms, shimmering with changes that chase each other over her skin. Frigga stands over them, her cool hand on Loki’s forehead, whispering rune words until the world slips away from both of them.

They sleep then, harried by fever dreams of consuming fire and ash that falls around them like snow. She cracks an eye once when fierce whispers penetrate the haze- Hlín and Gangleri, are they arguing?- but she is blinded by a harsh blue light that quickly steals her away again.

She wakes properly to the welcome feeling of Loki ruffling her ears, and feels better than she has in a long time. He holds her tight and whispers grateful nonsense into her fur, makes her promise not to do such a thing again. They can stand the ignorance, the short sightedness of their fellows, he says, rather than make themselves ill to please idiots. She takes Loki’s tacit apology for what it is and settles around his neck as a slim black snake, glad for the closeness.

“What are you called today?” Loki asks, as has been their habit for centuries, barring the last three turns.

She thinks she might like to be Svipall again, fleeting and changeable, but then the memory of fire, the reflection of ember red eyes drifts up like smoke and she hisses it out over the flicker of her tongue.

“I think I will keep Eisa for now,” she says. “I still have remnants of fire in me.”

In the end, it is the only thing that never changes again.

**Author's Note:**

> A Thor/MCU dæmon AU that sprang from nowhere. There will be more, and all will be revealed.
> 
> Thejerseydevile is totally to blame for this one.


End file.
